rtotheizzo17 said:
^Two things for why Vader is so bad in the ESB duel; One he is a frakenstein that has lost most of his organic being, and is not as fluid.
It doesn't hold water. We see in the new trilogy that Republic droid technology is capable of producing superb robotics. Grievious himself is semi-organic and can duel. There's no reason for Darth to be encumbered by his metallic parts - in fact, he should really be enhanced. Losing an arm at the end of episode 2 certainly didn't put a dent in his abilities.
rtotheizzo17 said:
Two he is not trying to kill Luke, he is toying with him to try and capture him. Luke never really holds him off, he pulls a few trick plays to scamper away, but in the end he is totally dominated for ten minutes.
Very true - agreed. Even so, I could have fought better than Luke did, without training from Yoda and without any help from the force. It doesn't matter though. We know that in reality, the fighting isn't as good simply because they didn't see the requirement (or it was never a consideration/too expensive) to hire a professional martial artist to train the actors to fight.
It really works though in a very theatrical sense. The fights aren't so much about the actual abilities of the combatants to duel with their weapons - it's about the way the players interact. It's about the way they thrust and parry with words, the way the story is told through the combat. That's what makes them so emotive and such powerful story telling.
The duel in ESB is especially fantastic. It's actually an allegory for the rest of the film. The entire film is all about defeat and betrayal and the final duel between Vader and Luke summarises it perfectly. The film is all about defeat after defeat. Every small victory is offset by a massive loss.
Every time Luke manages to push away Vader, it's one of the small victories (taking down an AT-At, or hiding in the asteroid), but then Vader pushes back and hurts Luke; batters him down (Echo base is lost, Han and Leia can't escape and put themselves in more danger in Bespin, Yoda fails to train Luke and Luke fails his training). Finally we reach Vader's reveal, and Ben's betrayal (Lando) and the loss of Luke's hand is allegorical to the loss of his right hand and saviour (from the Battle of Yavin) - Han Solo - now captured and taken by Boba Fett. Luke refuses to give in the to Dark Side and abandons hope and gives in to fate, as Lando gives up Bespin to the Empire and the summary and real-time story now merge and become one.
That's why the duel at the end of ESB is some fantastic and why it doesn't matter that the sword play is poor; it doesn't have to be, it's telling much more than the simple fight between a good guy and a bad guy. It's genius.
rtotheizzo17 said:
As far as the vision thing, I am fairly certain the vision you are referring to was Luke turning himself in during RotJ and setting up the final battle. My 12 year old self would be pissed I am blanking right now, but there was some reason why Luke and Leia were unknown/not hunted even while being hidden in plain sight.
There's some debate on the vision. The Emperor appears to Vader to be surprised about the reveal of the offspring of Anakin still being alive (ESB, first time we see the Emperor). However, by ROTJ, the Emperor seems to know a lot about Luke (though not his sister). The question that raises is one of if the Emperor was always aware of what would come to pass (to a degree), and played Vader along. Darth Sidious had no problem with sacrificing Count Dooku (his apprentice) to help push Anakin to the dark side. He knew that Vader would need replacing at some time, and to get Luke to murder his own father would open the dark side and push Luke to it. So knowing that Luke was alive, he kept the knowledge hidden until the time was right where he'd seen in a vision, Luke battling Darth (conjecture on my part as to what he saw in his vision). That's a very satisfying background story motivation for me
In actuality (and what you're looking for), at the end of RotS, Anakin thinks Padme was killed and the children with her. He simply doesn't know they survived. We know there were two Skywalkers on Tatooine (Anakin and his mother) - perhaps slaves took their owners name, or it's a name given to slaves who arrive on from off-world. In that case, Skywalker on Tatooine could be as common a surname as Smith is to the UK. So having a Skywalker there really is very safe.
Mix that with the Emperor perhaps ensuring Vader never considered his children may have lived, and you have quite a watertight plot
rtotheizzo17 said:
If you haven't already I reccomend watching The People vs George Lucas. It covers a lot of what we are discussing, and the merits of Lucas "bastardizing" his own franchise.
Is that on YouTube? I'll have to look
rtotheizzo17 said:
Anywho enough nerdism for me today
NEVER! :lol:
